First off, people don’t speak “Mexican”, they speak Spanish.
Second, the purely racist trope “you’re in America speak English” has been so overplayed by Republicans. Forget the fact that the United States has no official language, there is no requirement outside of lawyers to speak English. The reason why it is racist is because it makes an assumption that one language and culture is superior to another.
Finally, most of you can’t speak English yourselves so how can you push it on someone else?
Speaking with to Robert Costa of the Washington Post, Donald Trump defends his racist statements made during his candidacy announcement saying it was “okay” for him to have described undocumented immigrants as “rapists.” When asked about the using a word like rapists to describe a population, Trump responded:
It is a very rough word. It’s okay to use.
Also, lots of cursing:
“Look at that guy, look at what he did, killing that beautiful girl. [Expletive] animal.”
Who the [expletive] are you?
If I didn’t make a fortune, who the [expletive] is going to buy “The Art of the Deal”?
Their lives are [expletive] over.
What the [expletive] else do you have? Are you finished yet?
After Donald Trump spoke in Vegas today, a man who said he’s from Mexico confronted him during his Q&A and said he’s “incredibly insulted” by what Trump has been saying about illegal immigrants and Mexico.
He told Trump he’s being unfair to paint all illegal immigrants with a broad brush, but Trump piped up, “Did the government of Mexico ask you to come up and say this?”
The man dismissed Trump’s comment and asked him if he would build walls around every U.S. state to keep out all the rapists and criminals who are already in the United States and cross state lines.
Trump continued to stand by everything he’s said thus far on the matter, and right before they moved on, the man shouted, “Did you read the Statue of Liberty?”
Reality
It was completely unfair of Trump to dismiss this voter’s concerns and turn around and ask if the Mexican government sent him. There’s a word for this that escapes me at the moment, but it isn’t a good word.
The man who declared some Mexican immigrants to be criminals and “rapists” three weeks ago has a message for those in the Latino community offended by his remarks: “There’s nothing to apologize for.”
I’ll win the Latino vote because I’ll create jobs, I’ll create jobs and the Latinos will have jobs they didn’t have. I’ll do better on that vote than anybody. I will win that vote.
Trump both defended his relationship with the Latino community, “They love me!” he said, and doubled down on his remarks that Mexico is harming the U.S. at the border.
Don’t try and convince me that there’s no crime, that it’s wonderful. Mexico doesn’t want these people they’re forcing them into our country and we’re taking them and putting them in our jails and our hospitals and it’s a disgrace.
Reality
Saying Latinos will have jobs they haven’t had before is easily one of the most racist statements Trump has made, and he’s made a lot. Here Donald Trump is implying that Latinos can only be regulated to certain jobs and now under Trump he’ll have new jobs, just for Latinos.
Donal Trump tweeted that Jeb Bush likes “Mexican illegals because of his wife.” The tweet has since been deleted.
Thankfully things are never deleted on the internet.
The tweet stayed up for 24 hours before Trump deleted it.
Later at the Republican CNN debate on 9/16/2015, Trump was asked to apologize for the comment, to which he responded:
“No. I said nothing wrong.”
Reality
There is a reason why Trump tried to delete this tweet, it’s racist and intolerant as hell.
During his campaign speech, Donald Trump characterized Mexican immigrants as potential criminals and rapists, which we explained how and why this is racist. So he is starting from a basis of racism for his premise.
Donald J. Trump descended “Stair Force One” to announce his candidacy for the Republican nomination for the President of the United States of America and his first overtly racist comment by implying that the country of Mexico is intentionally sending immigrants who are criminals and rapists.
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
Reality
Donald Trump described people from Mexico as having “lots of problems”, drug users, rapists, and criminals. By painting a large swath of people with a single brush as “dangerous” he is using baseless stereotyping in an attempt to prove that Hispanics are different in their social behavior.
You might try to make the case that immigrants are still committing crimes, even if they are at a lower rate of natural-born citizens, however that does not explain away the fact that Trump is singling out an individual ethnic group as the cause of the problems in America. That is why is statement is racist.
Immigrants generally have a stronger incentive than native-born Americans to stay out of legal trouble — especially undocumented immigrants, who risk deportation. And those who legally are in the United States (or are pursuing legal status) are required to pass a criminal background check.
“Immigrants in general — unauthorized immigrants in particular — are a self-selected group who generally come to the U.S. to work. And once they’re here, most of them want to keep their nose down and do their business, and they’re sensitive to the fact that they’re vulnerable,” said Marc Rosenblum, deputy director of the U.S. Immigration Policy Program at the Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank.
And the data backs up this theory.
Crime Rates
FALSE – According to the Congressional Research Service, incarcerated non-citizens represented 7.2% of the total incarcerated population of 2.4 million, a proportion similar to the noncitizen proportion of the foreign-born population. If illegal immigrants were bringing high crime then their should be a larger number of incarcerated illegal immigrants compared to the national population.
Mexicans Are Rapists
FALSE – Of all of the convictions of illegal immigrants in 2013 (the majority of whom were from Mexico) only 1.6% was sex offenses. Immigration offenses account for the largest portion of federal convictions of immigrants, followed by drugs, then traffic violations.
Crime Category
2013
Immigration
31.3%
Dangerous Drugs
15.4%
Traffic Violations
15.0%
Assault
10.2%
Burglary
2.8%
Weapon Offenses
2.7%
Larceny
2.7%
Fraud
2.6%
Sexual Assault
1.6%
Forgery
1.5%
Other
14.2%
Compare the 1.6% number to the national average of 12.2% of convicted prisoners who committed sexual offenses. So an illegal immigrant is 7.5x less likely to commit a sexual offense.
